times at the
barber's a similar hypnotic feeling had come over him, some electric
current stirred by the brushing of his hair, when common sounds and
movements struck on his nerves like music. Again his nerves vibrated
tunefully, and he became aware that she was speaking.

"So sorry to have troubled you," she said, and prepared to go.

He felt he must keep her at any cost. "A foot like yours needs a
special last shaped to the foot. I don't make to order now, as a rule,
but I'll try wot I can do fer yer, if yer care to leave an order," he
said. He spoke like one in a dream.

She looked at him with a peculiar, intense gaze. "I should prefer
that, but I'm afraid they would be too expensive," she said.

"No, I can do them at the same price as Kling & Wessel's," said Jonah.

Miss Giltinan started and looked sharply from Jonah to his customer.
She knew that was impossible. And she looked with a frown at this
woman who could make Jonah forget his business instincts for a minute.
For she worshipped him in secret, grateful to him for lifting her out
of the gutter, and regarded him as the arbiter of her destiny.

He went to the desk and found the sliding rule and tape. As he passed
the tape round the stranger's foot, he found that his hands were
trembling. And as he knelt before her on one knee, the young woman
studied, with a slight repugnance, the large head, wedged beneath the
shoulders as if a giant's hand had pressed it down, and the hump
projecting behind, monstrous and inhuman. Suddenly Jonah looked up and
met her eyes. She coloured faintly.

"Wot sort of fit do yer like?" he asked. His voice, usually sharp and
nasal, was rather hoarse.

All her life she remembered that moment. The huge shop, glittering
with varnish, mirrors, and brass rods, the penetrating odour of
leather, the saleswoman silently copying the figures into the book, and
the misshapen hunchback kneeling before her and looking up into her
face with his restless grey eyes, grown suddenly steady, that asked one
question and sought another. She frowned slightly, conscious of some
strange and disagreeable sensation.

"I prefer them as tight as possible without hurting me," she replied
nervously; "but I'm afraid I'm giving you too much trouble."

"Not a bit," replied Jonah, clearing his throat.

As he finished measuring, a small boy, dressed in a Fauntleroy velvet
suit, with an enormous collar and a flap cap, ran noisily into the
shop, dra